Prairie voles without oxytocin receptors still formed lifelong bonds and had kids, a new study finds, suggesting its effect on social behaviors isn't so clear.
A team of researchers at Stanford University and elsewhere have long been interested in studying prairie voles, particularly as a model for better understanding social behavior in humans. More recently, they’ve begun to develop techniques for selectively editing the genes of these animals using CRISPR, a practice commonly used for studying mice and other animals.
To their astonishment, the mutant voles didn’t really seem all that different, both in how they bonded to their partners and took care of their pups .“Despite being oxytocin receptor-less, male and female voles form long-term social attachments following sexual encounters.
The results do conflict with past studies that tried to block oxytocin in these voles, but the differences might amount to how this was accomplished, the authors say. Drugs that can suppress the oxytocin receptor in adult voles, for instance, could possibly have other off-target effects, whereas the team’s gene editing should be more precise.
The team’s findings, published in Neuron on Friday, aren’t the first to suggest that oxytocin’s effect onisn’t so cut and dry. Trials testing whether giving people oxytocin can boost their ability to trust others have
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